Happy Mutants food and drink topic (Part 1)

Wow! That looks good and like you made an effort. My bachelor’s breakfast typically is pan crisped corned beef hash (fresh from the can) and egg. My wife thinks it looks like dog food and won’t go near it.

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My neighbors sounded so down about Thanksgiving, no family visiting, etc. I said, let’s do a pie exchange! They said yes!

Which leads me to another idea: let’s do a pie exchange here! Obv we cannot eat them. But we can exchange pics and descriptions and ooh ahhs over them.

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Great idea!
Laurie made the crust today and will construct the pie tomorrow morning. I will try to snap a few photos to share.
Cheers!

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I’m going to try to make a frito pie this weekend as a “I’m too lazy to cook today” go-to meal for the week. Looks easy enough.

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We’re doing a Zoom Thanksgiving on the day of, but we are exchanging turkey and various sides and pies with each other via drop-off. That’s more efficient than 4 families making the whole spread for themselves.

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That made me laugh out loud - she’s great. For a more succinct sharing of a similar view, here’s the 30 second version.

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It’s nearly crunch time again. :woman_cook:t4: I hope those helplines are fully staffed and ready…

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Careful with that. My household has been locked in a never ending pie off with the neighbors since March.

I’ve have never been so sick of pie in my entire life, and apparently there are seven for tomorrow, more pie than people in attendance.

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Pork meat ball soup. Chicken stock and rice noodles.

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Cooking Kabocha squash to make pumpkin pie tomorrow.

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You use kabocha in place of pumpkin? Wow. How is it?

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Better than the sugar pie pumpkins I have used before, more “pumpkiny”.

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Is It a thing?

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Cool. Sometimes I make mayonnaise salad with it.

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Deep-fried turkey is definitely a thing, and it can be quite the fire hazard when cooking. If you’re going to do that, you want that cooker to be outdoors and away from anything combustible.

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Also to check the oil level with the turkey in it before you start the fire.

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Mixed feels…

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My better half is fully Italian, I suggested duck stock and she was not impressed, seems the order is capon, old hen, or a normal chicken in terms of best meats to make stocks… as an aside, do you make your stock in a pressure cooker? We found that not only is it quicker (obvs) but that it tastes a lot better as a lot of the flavor, especially the spices, don’t get to escape with the steam.

Cappeletti in brodo is our Xmas first course, all handmade, but oh man what a chore making them.

I’ve only made a few duck dishes, but duck ragu is a definite standout, the meat works really well with the sauce, and it goes really well with gnocchi.

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Cool! We’re doing butternut squash in place of pumpkin this year, since we had so many from the garden. I’ll post here later.

I never would’ve even thought of using pumpkin or winter squash for something like that, but it looks good! We don’t get Japanese Mayo here, so I’ll have to find out the difference between that and the stuff we have (we make homemade based on standard “American” recipe.)

I hadn’t ever before, but great tip, thanks!

We’re listening to the Splendid Table thanksgiving special this morning, but so far I’ve gotten at least as many tips from this thread. :grin:

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Sugar pumpkins are, despite the name, an ornamental. All pumpkin really means is “round winter squash” and there’s 3 species and a hell of a lot of cultivars involved. Your orange, ribbed, front of a greeting card pumpkins are mostly C. pepo the same species as acorn squash, zucchini, and other things that don’t taste much like pumpkin.

Most of those varietals have been bred and are grown for ornamental purposes. Sugar pumpkins are basically an attempt to make those ornamentals more palatable by breeding them for a higher sugar content. Historically the major use for these was animal fodder.

Your preferred eating pumpkins are C. moschata and C. maxima. And it’s C. moschata that has that classic pumpkin taste and texture, and what ends up in those cans. Kobacha is C. maxima which is also pretty dandy.

C. moschata includes butternut squash, long island cheese pumpkins, fairy tale pumpkins. C. maxima kobacha, hubbard squash, and buttercup.

Kabocha is pumpkin. It’s often sold in the US as “Japanese Pumpkin”, “Pumpkin” is often used to translate the Japanese word. A lot of languages just don’t make a distinction between winter squash and pumpkins. They’re all either pumpkins or winter squash as a category. And I think kabocha is just a general Japanese word for winter squashes, or at least round ones. Though obviously it’s the name of this specific variety in English.

It’s also clearer if that matters to folks. IIRC it’s an important thing for Tortellini en Brodo. I usually don’t sweat a cloudy stock or broth, but the pressure cooker gets me a nice clear almost consume grade stock or broth with zero effort.

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